8.23.2010

SeaWorld has been fined $75,000 by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for three safety violations, including one classified as willful, after an animal trainer was killed in February.

In a statement Monday, Cindy Coe, OSHA's regional administrator, said that SeaWorld knew of the inherent risks of allowing trainers to interact with dangerous animals.

"Nonetheless, it required its employees to work within the pool walls, on ledges and on shelves where they were subject to dangerous behavior by the animals," Coe said in the statement.

SeaWorld denied what it called "unfounded" allegations by the U.S. Department of Labor agency and said it would contest the citations.

"OSHA's allegations in this citation are unsupported by any evidence or precedent and reflect a fundamental lack of understanding of the safety requirements associated with marine mammal care penalties," a SeaWorld statement said Monday.

In February, a 12,000-pound killer whale at the Orlando, Florida, SeaWorld pulled trainer Dawn Brancheau, 40, underwater and killed her as horrified park visitors watched. An autopsy report showed Brancheau died from drowning and traumatic injuries to her body, including her spine, ribs and head.

The OSHA statement said the whale involved was one of three also involved in the death of an animal trainer in 1991 at a Vancouver, British Columbia, water park.

The agency's investigation "revealed that SeaWorld trainers had an extensive history of unexpected and potentially dangerous incidents involving killer whales at its various facilities, including its location in Orlando," the OSHA statement said. "Despite this record, management failed to make meaningful changes to improve the safety of the work environment for its employees."

OSHA issued one "willful" citation -- defined as a violation committed with plain indifference or intentional disregard for employee safety health -- for "exposing its employees to hazards when interacting with killer whales," the statement said.

A second citation classified as "serious" was issued for failing to install a stairway railing system on one side of a stadium stage, the OSHA statement said, adding that such a violation is when "death or serious physical harm is likely to result from a hazard about which the employer knew or should have known."

A third citation considered less serious involved a failure to put weatherproof enclosures over outdoor electrical receptacles, the statement said.

In response, the SeaWorld statement said its internal review reached a different conclusion. Without providing details, the statement said the conclusions were "drawn from decades of experience caring for marine mammals."

"The safety of SeaWorld's killer whale program was already a model for marine zoological facilities around the world and the changes we are now undertaking in personal safety, facility design and communication will make the display of killer whales at SeaWorld parks safer still," the SeaWorld statement said.

It noted that killer whales at SeaWorld "are displayed under valid federal permits and under the supervision of two government agencies with directly applicable expertise: The U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service and the U.S. Department of Commerce National Marine Fisheries Service."

The SeaWorld statement also said its trainers were "among the most skilled, trained and committed zoological professionals in the world today."

"The fact that there have been so few incidents over more than 2 million separate interactions with killer whales is evidence not just of SeaWorld's commitment to safety, but to the success of that training and the skill and professionalism of our staff," the SeaWorld statement said.

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

8.13.2010

PORT VILLA, Vanuatu -- An unprecedented agreement toward the cooperative stewardship of a vast swath of Pacific Ocean has been reached, and conservationists are heralding it as among the most ambitious, innovative, and collaborative marine initiatives on Earth.

Meeting in Port Villa, Vanuatu at the annual Pacific Islands Leadership Forum, Heads of State and Governments from 15 nations endorsed a draft framework for the long-term, sustainable, and cooperative management of 38.5 million km2 (nearly 24 million square miles) surrounding their collective islands, or comparatively larger than the land size of Canada, the United States and Mexico - combined.

The Framework, called the Pacific Oceanscape, aims to address all ocean issues from governance to climate change, as well as design policies and implement practices that will improve ocean health, increase resources and expertise, and encourage governments to factor ocean issues into decisions about economic and sustainable development. It represents perhaps the largest marine conservation management initiative in history, as measured by countries and area, and a new united Pacific voice on ocean conservation and management.

In a Communiqué announcing the agreement, leaders from Australia, the Cook Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, the Republic of Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu agreed to a Pacific Oceanscape framework, and "reiterated the critical importance of ensuring the sustainable development, management and conservation of our oceans."

Introduced to Forum Leaders in 2009 by President Anote Tong of Kiribati, the Pacific Oceanscape plan was designed with support from Conservation International (CI) which has also committed technical and scientific assistance for implementation.

"It is, without doubt, the most ambitious, most innovative, and most well-grounded marine initiative I have seen in my 32 years as a marine biologist and conservationist," said Dr. Greg Stone, CI's Chief Ocean Scientist and Senior Vice President for Marine Conservation. "What we are seeing here is the dawning of a new era for marine management at such a massive, multi-national scale, and the kind of leadership that brings about real, positive change."

Increasing threats, including climate change, to Pacific Island states has spurred their Leaders toward the historic measures.

"Climate change threatens our very existence. With rising sea levels, overfishing, warming ocean temperatures pollution, and acidification, our oceans are changing in ways that our ancestors could not have imagined," said President Tong,. "There is an urgent need for us to join together and face these common threats, if we are to successfully manage and conserve the ocean's precious resources for present and future generations of people."

Tong added, "The new Pacific Oceanscape will help us build resilience in ocean ecosystems so that marine life has the best chance of adapting. Only by doing this can there be some assurance that the oceans, and millions of people who depend on them directly for their livelihood and well-being, will survive the onslaught of global climate change."

The Pacific Oceanscape will address many ocean challenges in the region both in countries' Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) as well as the High Seas connecting them, including climate change, security and enforcement, and the establishment of multi-use marine protected areas.

CI's Pacific Islands Program Marine Director, Sue Miller-Taei, speaking from Samoa, emphasized the impressive regional ownership of the new plan.

"Input and ownership across all sectors, from fisheries to universities, environmentalists, and government, has created a framework that everyone wants to succeed. In my twenty years of working in this region, I have never seen such widespread support and engagement. This is a precious commodity."

Agreement of the Pacific Oceanscape plan this week came on the heels of similar large-scale success in the region as UNESCO named Kiribati's Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA) a new, natural World Heritage site. The designation makes PIPA's 408,250 km2 the largest marine World Heritage site on the planet, and a natural climate change research laboratory that offers scientists many opportunities to study impacts of climate change, well into the future.

Working alongside other marine initiatives in the region (eg., the Coral Triangle Initiative, the IUCN Pacific Ocean 2020, the Micronesian Challenge) implementation of the Pacific Oceanscape will help to contribute to wider management of the Pacific Ocean, and organize the region on ocean issues with a holistic approach. The central Pacific contains some of the most pristine and robust coral reefs, islands, seamounts and marine systems remaining in the world today.

With formal adoption of the new Pacific Oceanscape, leaders now hope their demonstrated leadership and success in improving ocean health will spur replication among other governments and regions that depend on the many benefits of a healthy ocean for their own national wellbeing.

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

8.09.2010

Since the smell test doesn't really cut it, we decided to investigate the chemicals in seafood that you might not know about. We all know that mercury is often found in fish and are careful about our mercury consumption but did you know about the presence of pesticides, flame retardants or arsenic in the world's seafood?

2.6 billion people obtain 20 percent of their animal protein from eating seafood. Contaminants leak into the world's water supplies from industrial and municipal waste, storm water runoff and even agricultural practices causing serious environmental, animal and human health issues.

1. PBDEs: Flame RetardantsPBDEs, a common flame retardant, have been detected in various fish across the West Coast in the United States. A 2006 report from the Environmental Working Group uncovered the flame retardant in Washington rivers and lakes. From 1997 to 2003, levels of PBDEs (prolybrominated diphenyl ethers) doubled in San Francisco Bay fish, such as striped bass and halibut. PBDEs are often used in electronics, furniture, carpets and textiles. The chemicals are traceable in rivers, estuaries, oceans, house dust and water.

2. PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls)While PCBs were outlawed from manufacturing in 1977, PCBs continue to reside in the nation’s waters. They collect in sediments at the bottoms of rivers, lakes, streams and along coastlines. These highly toxic persistent organic pollutants infiltrate water systems and contaminate wild fish populations accumulating in the fatty tissue of the fish. The industrial chemical is also found in farmed fish. Striped bass, sturgeon, and shad are all fishes with dangerous traces of PCBs.

3. Chlorinated DioxinsHigh levels of chlorinated dioxins, an industrial chemical and known carcinogen, are often detected in wild and farmed fish populations and in most animal based proteins in the average American diet: eggs, milk, butter, turkey, beef and pork. The Environmental Defense Fund advises limiting the intake of farmed or Atlantic salmon because of the elevated dioxin rate.

4. DDT: PesticidesDDT, one of the most infamous pesticides, has infiltrated the aquatic foodchain, impacting most fish, crayfish, and shrimp populations. In 1952, the United States Department of Agriculture celebrated the use of DDT because of its "cost, ease of handling, safety to humans, effectiveness in destroying the pest, and safety to wildlife." In 1974, DDT was banned from use by the Environmental Protection Agency, however DDT residue remains

5. OilAmongst the chaos of the gulf oil spill recovery, one "solution" for contamination detection has been the smell test. With fishing permitted again in Louisiana, fishermen have begun to catch redfish, speckled trout and mullet. Oysters and blue crabs remain off-limits.

6. ArsenicCoal ash combustion wastewater does not only disperse mercury but also arsenic, which causes detrimental harm to the environment, fish health, and a variety of human health problems such as liver poisoning, and liver and bladder cancers. With low water levels, arsenic levels rise as occurred in 2007 in Okeechobee, Florida (pictured).

7. MelamineIn 2008, China’s reputation as the world’s largest fish importer was tarnished by one chemical: melamine. Melamine was often added to fish feed. This industrial chemical is also famous for tainting infant formula. Last month, the United Nations set a maximum level of melamine contamination in the world's food and infant formula.

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

BARATARIA, La. – To assess how heavy a blow the BP oil spill has dealt the Gulf of Mexico, researchers are closely watching a staple of the seafood industry and primary indicator of the ecosystem's health: the blue crab.

Weeks ago, before engineers pumped in mud and cement to plug the gusher, scientists began finding specks of oil in crab larvae plucked from waters across the Gulf coast.

The government said last week that three-quarters of the spilled oil has been removed or naturally dissipated from the water. But the crab larvae discovery was an ominous sign that crude had already infiltrated the Gulf's vast food web — and could affect it for years to come.

"It would suggest the oil has reached a position where it can start moving up the food chain instead of just hanging in the water," said Bob Thomas, a biologist at Loyola University in New Orleans. "Something likely will eat those oiled larvae ... and then that animal will be eaten by something bigger and so on."

Tiny creatures might take in such low amounts of oil that they could survive, Thomas said. But those at the top of the chain, such as dolphins and tuna, could get fatal "megadoses."

Marine biologists routinely gather shellfish for study. Since the spill began, many of the crab larvae collected have had the distinctive orange oil droplets, said Harriet Perry, a biologist with the University of Southern Mississippi's Gulf Coast Research Laboratory.

"In my 42 years of studying crabs I've never seen this," Perry said.She wouldn't estimate how much of the crab larvae are contaminated overall, but said about 40 percent of the area they are known to inhabit has been affected by oil from the spill.

Tulane University researchers are investigating whether the splotches also contain toxic chemical dispersants that were spread to break up the oil but have reached no conclusions, biologist Caz Taylor said.

If large numbers of blue crab larvae are tainted, their population is virtually certain to take a hit over the next year and perhaps longer, scientists say.

How large the die-off would be is unclear, Perry said. An estimated 207 million gallons of oil have spewed into the Gulf since an April 20 drilling rig explosion triggered the spill, and thousands of gallons of dispersant chemicals have been dumped.

Scientists will be focusing on crabs because they're a "keystone species" that play a crucial role in the food web as both predator and prey, Perry said.

Richard Condrey, a Louisiana State University oceanographer, said the crabs are "a living repository of information on the health of the environment."

Named for the light-blue tint of their claws, the crabs have thick shells and 10 legs, allowing them to swim and scuttle across bottomlands. As adults, they live in the Gulf's bays and estuaries amid marshes that offer protection and abundant food, including snails, tiny shellfish, plants and even smaller crabs. In turn, they provide sustenance for a variety of wildlife, from redfish to raccoons and whooping cranes.Adults could be harmed by direct contact with oil and from eating polluted food. But scientists are particularly worried about the vulnerable larvae.

That's because females don't lay their eggs in sheltered places, but in areas where estuaries meet the open sea. Condrey discovered several years ago that some even deposit offspring on shoals miles offshore in the Gulf.

The larvae grow as they drift with the currents back toward the estuaries for a month or longer. Many are eaten by predators, and only a handful of the 3 million or so eggs from a single female live to adulthood.

But their survival could drop even lower if the larvae run into oil and dispersants."Crabs are very abundant. I don't think we're looking at extinction or anything close to it," said Taylor, one of the researchers who discovered the orange spots.

Still, crabs and other estuary-dependent species such as shrimp and red snapper could feel the effects of remnants of the spill for years, Perry said.

"There could be some mortality, but how much is impossible to say at this point," said Vince Guillory, biologist manager with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

Perry, Taylor and Condrey will be among scientists monitoring crabs for negative effects such as population drop-offs and damage to reproductive capabilities and growth rates.

Crabs are big business in the region. In Louisiana alone, some 33 million pounds are harvested annually, generating nearly $300 million in economic activity, Guillory said.

But fishermen who can make a six-figure income off crabs in a good year now are now idled — and worried about the future.

"If they'd let us go out and fish today, we'd probably catch crabs," said Glen Despaux, 37, who sets his traps in Louisiana's Barataria Bay. "But what's going to happen next year, if this water is polluted and it's killing the eggs and the larvae? I think it's going to be a long-term problem."

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

8.05.2010

IT TAKES a brave soul to race to the rescue of a stranded great white shark.

There are those teeth for one thing - large and sharp enough to take off a man's helping hand, even out of the water.

But Andrew Eckersley didn't think twice last Friday morning when he spotted one of the fearsome predators washed up on a beach on the Mid-North Coast in New South Wales.

Mr Eckersley and a lone surfer rushed to the 3m shark's aid, treating it with the kind of care and compassion usually reserved for beached whales.

"It was pretty scary at first. This guy in a wetsuit was sort of baling water on to its back by hand and digging out a hole for it on the ocean side," Mr Eckersley said yesterday.

"It was pretty big. I wouldn't have been able to put my fingers together if I was giving it a cuddle."

Using logs they found on the beach, the pair tried levering the shark out of the sand to get it into deeper water.

"There was the thought while we were getting the logs under it that I might pinch it or something and it would lunge at me," he said.

Thankfully, it didn't, but the logs failed to free it from the sand, so the pair tried gently pulling the beast out to sea, "inch-by-inch".

"We got it out to about mid-thigh depth and it was starting to perk up again, which was exciting," Mr Eckersley said.

"I think the other guy started to get his confidence up a bit when he realised it wasn't going to bite our legs off, so he took it out a bit further."

Photographer Ruth Fahey, who captured the remarkable rescue on Hungry Head beach, said she first thought the maneater was a stranded dolphin. "Then I got closer and saw it was this huge shark and just thought, 'Holy crap!'," she said.

Once it got to deeper water the shark slowly started to recover and disappeared beneath the breakers, heading out to sea. But sadly, it was discovered dead on the same beach the following day.

Its jaws had been hacked out by someone as a souvenir, an illegal practice in NSW.

Sydney Aquarium aquatic biologist Sebastian Schmid said it was "very unusual" for a live great white to wash up on a beach and suggested it was already sick when it first came ashore.

OCEANIC DEFENSE COMMENT:We appreciate these two gentlemen that attempted to save this great creature. Unfortunately, the writer of the article tried to place a sensationalistic "Great White" spin on the piece to make it a bit more "exciting" Perpetuating stereo types does nothing to protect the species already misrepresented so wrongly in the media. - Jeff Shaw - Oceanic Defense

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

The areas in red are the most oxygen-depleted areas detected in the Gulf from July 24 to Aug. 2, 2010.

NEW ORLEANS — This year's low-oxygen "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico is probably the largest on record and overlaps areas hit by oil from BP's well disaster, scientists report.

The area of hypoxia, or low levels of oxygen, covered more than 7,722 square miles of the bottom of the Gulf and extended far into Texas waters, researchers from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium said in a statement after surveying the waters.

The area would have included a section off Galveston, Texas, but bad weather forced the surveyors to turn back early."The total area probably would have been the largest if we had enough time to completely map the western part," said Nancy Rabalais, the consortium's executive director.The largest dead zone measured since surveys began in 1985 was just over 8,000 square miles in 2001.

The annual summer "dead zone" in the Gulf is fueled by farm chemicals carried by the Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers. Nitrogen and phosphorus in agricultural runoff stimulates algae growth in the Gulf.

When these tiny plants or fecal matter from animals that eat them settles to the bottom waters, decomposition of this organic material by bacteria consumes oxygen in the water, the consortium said.

The result, the researchers said, is oxygen depletion that forces many types of fish, shrimp and crabs to leave the area or suffocate. Animals that live in the sediments that can survive with little oxygen will die if the oxygen level falls toward zero.

To be considered hypoxic, oxygen content in the bottom waters of the Gulf must reach the level of 2 parts per million or less.

By late July, large patches of the northern Gulf had reached that level, including one swath off Galveston Bay.

The area of the BP oil spill overlaps some parts of the "dead zone," Rabalais said, and microbes that eat the oil can deplete oxygen in the water.

But the researchers couldn't say there is a definite connection between the spill and the dead zone's size.

"It would be difficult to link conditions seen this summer with oil from the BP spill in either a positive or negative way," Rabalais said.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38524140/ns/us_news-environment/About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

8.04.2010

ScienceDaily — Researchers at the University of Hawaii at Manoa say that the Leeward side of Hawaiian Islands may be ideal for future ocean-based renewable energy plants that would use seawater from the oceans' depths to drive massive heat engines and produce steady amounts of renewable energy.

The technology, referred to as Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC), is described in the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, which is published by the American Institute of Physics (AIP).

It involves placing a heat engine between warm water collected at the ocean's surface and cold water pumped from the deep ocean. Like a ball rolling downhill, heat flows from the warm reservoir to the cool one. The greater the temperature difference, the stronger the flow of heat that can be used to do useful work such as spinning a turbine and generating electricity.

The history of OTEC dates back more than a half century. However, the technology has never taken off -- largely because of the relatively low cost of oil and other fossil fuels. But if there are any places on Earth where large OTEC facilities would be most cost competitive, it is where the ocean temperature differentials are the greatest.

Analyzing data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Oceanographic Data Center, the University of Hawaii's Gérard Nihous says that the warm-cold temperature differential is about one degree Celsius greater on the leeward (western) side of the Hawaiian Islands than that on the windward (eastern) side.

This small difference translates to 15 percent more power for an OTEC plant, says Nihous, whose theoretical work focuses on driving down cost and increasing efficiency of future facilities, the biggest hurdles to bringing the technology to the mainstream.

"Testing that was done in the 1980s clearly demonstrates the feasibility of this technology," he says. "Now it's just a matter of paying for it."

About Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

8.02.2010

ON THE GULF OF MEXICO — Even the people who make their living off the seafood-rich waters of Louisiana's St. Bernard Parish have a hard time swallowing the government's assurances that fish harvested in the shallow, muddy waters just offshore must be safe to eat because they don't smell too bad.

Fresh splotches of chocolate-colored crude, probably globules broken apart by toxic chemical dispersants sprayed by BP with government approval, still wash up almost daily on protective boom and in marshes in reopened fishing grounds east of the Mississippi River.

When shrimp season opens in a couple of weeks and fisherman Rusty Graybill drags his nets across the mucky bottom, he worries that he'll also collect traces of oil and dispersants – and that even if his catch doesn't smell, buyers and consumers will turn up their noses."If I put fish in a barrel of water and poured oil and Dove detergent over that, and mixed it up, would you eat that fish?" asked Graybill, a 28-year-old commercial oyster, blue crab and shrimp angler who grew up fishing the marshes of St. Bernard. "I wouldn't feed it to you or my family. I'm afraid someone's going to get sick."

Louisiana wildlife regulators on Friday reopened state-controlled waters east of the Mississippi to harvesting of shrimp and "fin fish" such as redfish, mullet and trout. Smell tests on dozens of specimens from the area revealed barely traceable amounts of toxins, the federal Food and Drug Administration said.

The tests were done not by chemical analysis, but by scientists trained to detect the smell of oil and dispersant.

Chemical tests on fish for oil-related compounds are routine, but no such test exists for detecting levels of dispersant, said Meghan Scott, FDA spokeswoman. Federal scientists are developing one, she said. It wasn't clear when one would be ready, though.

The dispersants can kill incubating sea life, experts say, though its long-term effects are unknown. In humans, long-term exposure can cause central nervous system problems or damage blood, kidneys or livers, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention.Congressional investigators said over the weekend that the Coast Guard routinely approved BP requests to use thousands of gallons of dispersant a day despite a federal directive to cut its use.

Retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said Sunday that federal regulators did not ignore environmental guidelines, but that some field commanders were given the authority to allow more dispersants on a case-by-case basis.

BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles took reporters on a boat tour of beaches and marshes on Sunday and said "they wouldn't open these waters ... if it wasn't safe to eat the fish." He said he would eat Gulf seafood and "would serve it to my family."

Like most fishermen in St. Bernard, the bulk of Graybill's income comes from oysters, blue crab and shrimp. The first two are still off limits, and the shrimp season doesn't start for two weeks. Graybill had been earning money from BP under the "Vessels of Opportunity" program allowing idled fishing vessels to help with cleanup work, but that program was scaled back Thursday.Signs that anglers weren't jumping back into the waters abounded Saturday, especially at the annual Blessing of the Boats in Shell Beach, Hopedale and Delacroix, where the Rev. John Arnone of St. Bernard Catholic Church blessed far fewer than usual.

As Graybill maneuvered his light blue shrimp trawler Saturday near Comfort Island, which borders the open fishing grounds in Chandeleur Sound, fresh globs of oil glistened in the midday sun, staining the orange and yellow boom protecting the island. A dozen or so brown pelicans lazed on the oily boom.

Just the perception that he'll be pulling in oily shrimp, let alone that it might really happen, can greatly reduce the price he can get, he said.

"They capped the well, they stopped the oil, so now they're trying to hurry up and get us back working to where they can say everything's fine when it's not," he said. "It's not fine."Giving the OK to reopen one closed fishery does not mean it couldn't be closed again if more oil shows up, FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg said Friday.

"At the moment this is good news," she said after the reopening announcement. "But we have to remain vigilant."

Across the street from where Graybill usually delivers his catch, Dawn Nunez's family has for 30 years operated a wholesale business that sells shrimp to restaurants and seafood processors. She worries no one will want to the local catch.

It's absurd that the government is reopening the fishery when so many doubts linger, she said."It's nothing but a PR move," she said. "It's going to take years to know what damage they've done. It's just killed us all."

And relying only on a smell tests stinks, said Ryan Lambert, 52, a charter fishing captain who sometimes takes his clients out in the waters that just reopened. Fishing shouldn't resume, he said, until more data exist and better dispersant testing is devised.

"I have no confidence in their testing methods," Lambert said.

"But BP has just wanted to push, push, push to get us back fishing. You can't hurry it and then find something bad later," he said. "You can only cry wolf so many times before (customers) decide they aren't coming back."

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/02/oil-spill-gulf-fishermen_n_667044.htmlAbout Oceanic DefenseWe are an international non-profit organization with members in over 60 countries, spanning 6 continents with 1 mission; healthy aquatic ecosystems free from human abuse and neglect. Oceanic Defense teaches people to protect our oceans by acting responsibly as consumers and by making smart decisions in our daily lives. Whether we are buying groceries, commuting to work, planning a vacation or advocating within our own communities; each action we take or decision we make either helps or hurts our oceans. We empower people to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem and work together to protect our blue planet.

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